## Conversation with a correspondent of "Izvestia of the VTsIK" regarding the revolt of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries on July 7, 1918[188] Brief Summary

Source: PSS vol. 36

Revolution with remarkable consistency carries each proposition to its logical conclusion, ruthlessly exposing all the wretchedness, all the criminality of every mistaken tactic.

The Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, captivated by hollow phrases, have been howling for several months now: "Down with Brest, long live the uprising against the Germans!"

We replied to them that under the given conditions, in this historical period, the Russian people can and will not wage war.

Shutting their eyes to reality, with senseless obstinacy they continued to pursue their line, not feeling how they were moving further and further away from the popular masses, striving, at all costs, even by force, to impose their will upon these masses—the will of their Central Committee, which included criminal adventurers, hysterical intellectuals, and the like.

And as they departed from the people, they increasingly began to attract the sympathies of the bourgeoisie, which hoped to accomplish its designs through their hands.

The criminal terrorist act and the revolt completely and fully opened the eyes of the broad popular masses to the abyss into which the criminal tactics of the Left Socialist-Revolutionary adventurers were dragging the Soviet Russia of the people.

I myself and many comrades had occasion to hear on the day of the revolt expressions of the most violent indignation against the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries from even the darkest strata of the people.

An illiterate, simple old woman, indignant, spoke concerning the murder of Mirbach:

"Blast them, they've really pushed us into war!"

Everyone immediately and all at once understood with perfect clarity, and recognized, that after the Socialist-Revolutionary terrorist act Russia had come to the brink of war. This was precisely how the popular masses evaluated the actions of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries.

They provoke us into war with the Germans when we can and will not wage war. This crude trampling of the popular will, this violent pushing of the people into war—the popular masses will not forgive the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries for this.

And if anyone rejoiced at the actions of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries and rubbed their hands in malicious glee, it was only the White Guards and the lackeys of imperialist bourgeoisie. But the workers' and peasants' masses drew even closer, became even more bound together in these days with the Communist Bolshevik Party, the true expression of the will of the popular masses.

*Izvestia of the VTsIK* No. 141, July 8, 1918

Printed according to the text of the newspaper *Izvestia of the VTsIK*